The invention relates generally to systems for printing and reading forms for processing of data generated thereby. It relates specifically to a modular system, microprocessor-based, for printing a coded indentifier on a form and reading the coded identifier to generate data relating to the person identified by the code.
The prior art includes systems for printing and reading forms to generate data relating to particular persons identified on the forms. Systems used to gather and process data relating to school attendance recordkeeping included the printing of forms to be filled in manually by each teacher in each class, to be manually gathered, and to be manually read for processing of the data gathered thereby. The school attendance recordkeeping information manually gathered and entered in such system related to absences or tardiness, and clearance thereof, where such clearances were based on authorized excuses therefor.
Such school attendance recordkeeping systems enable the preparation of attendance reports required by the State, enable the tracking of attendance patterns for notification of parents when truancy occurs, and enable counseling of students when excessive absences are noted, so as to reduce attendance problems and increase daily attendance. Such systems must be further able to identify "tardy" students as opposed to those who are absent.
Among the problems associated with such school attendance recordkeeping systems are the collection, entry, maintenance and tracking of large amounts of data relating to absences, tardiness, and clearance information. Further, teachers are reluctant to devote time to such projects, such tasks are very labor-intensive, and the accuracy of the data gathered is highly questionable.
It has been known to provide a hand-held stylus, adapted to both optically read printed lines, such as bar codes, and print out information addressed at such bar codes and obtained thereby from computer storage, as in Uberbacher, Read/Write Stylus, IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin, Vol. 19, No. 1 (June 1976).
However, the stylus includes an optical read head at one end, and a special form electroerosion print head at the other end for enabling hand-directed printing on special aluminum-coated paper, and does not include elements and functions adapted for use in the school attendance recordkeeping process.
It has been further known to read bar code with devices which include various elements and functions, and which are adapted for use in various fields, including devices for imprinting price information, as in Snow U.S. Pat. No. 4,028,537, and for printing bar code and scanner alignment mark information, as in Bobart et al U.S. Pat. No. 4,349,741. Such known devices further include same for automatically inventorying coded items with a scanner and mark producing device, as in Koenig et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,180,204, counterfeit detecting, as in McNeight et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,463,250, and reading of bar code which may include an even or odd parity bit as part thereof, as in Mc Waters et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,402,088.
However, none of such devices include elements and functions adapted for use in processing data in a school attendance recordkeeping process, and for enabling a person's file therein to be directly addressible without correlation to a control file.